Block Party. Or Blocks and Partys.

I seem to have a case of writers block. If you can have writers block and not even be a proper writer. Every time I sit down to write a post I get overwhelmed, or underwhelmed, or discouraged, and have a small slew of unpublished posts building up. So I'm going to hit publish today, that is my goal.

This Saturday we're hosting a 4th of July breakfast party. This is the first real party I've hosted in my life, and I'm pretty nervous. I keep thinking through all the steps of each thing I need to make, obsessing over if I've forgotten anything important. I'm sure I will have forgotten something when all is said and done, but I really hope I've remembered enough that things will go smoothly. But I'm determined not to stress about it, and just have fun with it. I will return and report with my notes from what I learned for next year after the party.

The 4th of July has been my favorite holiday for most my life. My memories of the 4th while growing up are filled with hiking, swimming, water fights, bbq's and homemade ice cream. I think the thing that I enjoyed the most about the holiday is it never felt stressful. While I liked Christmas, there was an element of stress surrounding it that I didn't like. The 4th was also full of family time and good food, but without the stress, and it wasn't cold outside, win-win.


Anyway, I don't really have a point to this post, so I'll just say - Here's to a happy stress-free 4th of July :)

Amazing Grace

Last week I was reading the April 2012 Ensign, and there was an article titled "Amazing Grace". In it, the author says "Consider writing in your journal and sharing with your family about times when you have felt the Lord's grace healing, helping, or strengthening you".

When I read that I realized I haven't written down how much I have felt helped this year. I really forgot how hard it is to function on not much sleep, and how time consuming newborns really are. And there have been a few times since Karl has been born that I felt really depressed that I just couldn't do it. But consistently every time I have started the day while reading my scriptures while I'm nursing instead of reading my emails or blogs or whatever, I have been amazed at how well I have been able to cope with how little sleep I've had, and I truly feel it has been because He is helping me do things I could not do alone.

One instance in particular where I powerfully felt that help is while we were in Utah. On the day Erin was getting married,  when Karl woke up at 4:00 to eat, I was reading my scriptures while he nursed. I read some verses about the Lord strengthening the people of Nephi. I thought that there were probably ways I could serve that day, and the Lord could strengthen me too. So instead of going back to sleep I got ready and then when I heard people up and about downstairs I went down and was able to help with a few things down there. It really was more for me then anyone else, but I was so happy to be able to be there as Erin got ready to go to the temple, it was a really awesome sister time. The whole day was long and busy, but I had energy all day long, and although it was hard at time with the boys, we made it, and had a really great day.

So that's my little journal entry of when I've felt His grace strengthening me :)

Cereal

I found this on my computer today, I wrote it right after Grant and I got married. The memories made me smile and I decided to post it since I can't seem to write anything today :)

I try to be healthy. I try and exercise on a regular basis. I eat my vegetables, and always ignore my inner child and buy the bread that’s brown with the crunchy stuff in it instead of wonder bread. So when we went shopping yesterday, as Grant picked up his box of chocolate and peanut butter cereal, I dutifully walked over to the “grown-up” cereal section and picked up a granola-y looking concoction of “multigrain clusters”, because it told me it was a "healthy way to start my day".

So this morning, as I crunch on my “healthy” cereal, which, by the way, has a weird aftertaste, I start reading my cereal box. Unlike my husbands chocolate cereal, that had games on the back, mine only had an advertisement for energy bars. So for lack of anything better to do, I turn my box to the nutrition information. First thing I see is that my cereal has 13g of sugar. Not being any kind of dietician, I don’t know what that means, but it must be good, because it’s on healthy cereal, so I’m guessing that’s a low amount. Just for the sake of comparison, I grab my husbands cereal box. Sugar, 13g. Wait a second, that must be some kind of mistake (double check…..), nope, both cereals have the same amount of sugar. I keep reading, thinking somewhere my cereal will come out on top. Calories in mine:190. Calories in his: 130. Okay, it will get better, I’m sure, next on the list is Fat. Mine: 3g, His 3g. Hm. Neither of them have any cholesterol, his cereal has 23g of Carbohydrates, mine has 36g. His has more Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Calcium, Iron, Vitamin D, actually, it has more of every beneficial looking item on the list. The ONLY place my cereal seems to come out on top is Sodium. Mine: 95mg, his: 180mg.

By the time I had finished this comparison, my husband was feeling pretty smug, and I was feeling pretty sheepish. I guess I’m going to have to go back to eating cheerios every morning. Until then, I had something important to do. I walked to the sink, and watched with satisfaction as the disposal ground up those healthy little multi-grain clusters into oblivion, and poured myself a big bowl of chocolate peanut butter cereal. Boy was it good.

Quick quote

"You cannot drive people to do things which are right, but you can love them into doing them, if your example is of such a character that they can see you mean what you say" - George Albert Smith
 

Birthdays

Today Jefferson turned 6 and Duncan turned 3. It's so surreal to me that I've really been a mom for 6 years, and that I've only been a mom for 6 years. I can't imagine life without little people depending on me.

Something I want to remember about Jefferson - He LOVES creating. Whether creating elaborate art projects out of cardboard, tape and velcro or helping me cook in the kitchen he LOVES the process of making something out of something else. The other day we were riding in the car with a little boy in Duncan's preschool, Grayson, and Grayson was talking about one of his toys breaking, and Jefferson said "It's okay if a toy breaks, because you can make anything you want out of paper, so you can just make a new one". Every day he comes home from school with at least one craft project in his backpack, I wish I could figure out what to do with them all!

Something about Duncan - He is finally starting to really talk, but only on his terms. It is so fun to hear him talk more, but he still will just sit silently if he doesn't feel like talking and not respond to questions. Everything he does he does with his own little attitude and flair, he is such a big personality, and a lot of fun to hang out with. He loves Diego and Dora the Explorer, and will play in his room quite a while making up adventures and taking his stuffed animals along as his companions. He will build bridges and stairs out of books, then I'll hear him say "First we have to climb the stairs, then cross the sticky bridge, then we'll get to stone mountain!", just like Dora does.

Both boys are really excellent big brothers to Karl, I've been so happy with how sweet and kind they are with him.

Happy birthday to my 2 big boys!

Little blessings

Today I had several errands to run, nothing major, just small things at lots of different places, but getting the kids buckled and unbuckled multiple times always feels overwhelming to me.

The place I was dreading the most was the post office. We have 2 post offices within 5 min of our house. One has generally apathetic employees, but no parking lot, only street parking with meters. The other has a parking lot, but every time I've gone there with kids I feel like everyone there hates me for over-populating the planet or something, and the workers feel downright hostile.

Anyway, I decided for ease of dealing with Duncan and Karl to go to the one with the parking lot. I knew it was going to be hard carrying in the big box I had and the car seat carrier, and dealing with Duncan, so I said a little prayer that somehow there would be a nice person there that would help me with the doors (I know that seems like a really dumb thing to pray for... I just was imagining all these scenarios of Duncan running away and me holding a big box and a carrier and not able to do anything, and stuck trying to get in the 2 sets of doors... Okay, explaining it doesn't make it sound any less lame, but it felt like a very hard thing at the time...)

When I arrived at the post office I got the box balanced on my hip and had Karl in the other arm, and right then someone walked out of the post office, smiled at me, and held the first door. A smile and holding the door open - miracle! Then in the lobby there was another person who was getting their mail in their PO box who opened the 2nd door for me - Yay, I was in! THEN, there was a lady who took my box, and put it on the counter for me, and smiled at Karl, and a 2nd lady who started talking to Duncan, keeping him occupied.

To top it all off when I got to the counter the post office worker was actually nice, and told me to have a beautiful day when I left. They were all small things, but to me they all felt like little miracles, and it made my day.  

Two weeks

Two weeks from today we fly to Utah for Erin's and Lucas' weddings!! I am so very excited.

Also the property manager came and fixed our water heater today, which was also quite exciting, I'm very happy to know I can take a shower tomorrow morning.

On a not so exciting note, I made the mistake of letting Duncan get out of the cart while in World Market, and he quickly ran to the wine racks (which are kind of cool looking from a kids perspective I'm sure) and grabbed 2 bottles of red wine, breaking one of them and getting it all over himself... So we had a very smelly ride home.

This is a lame post, but I haven't posted for several days and wanted to try and write something tonight, and apparently this is all I've got, ha.

Prepare a Way

I feel like all I write recently is about being tired... I guess I'm a little preoccupied with sleep (or lack thereof, ha) as of late.

But, once again.... This week Karl had had a couple especially rough nights in a row, and I was feeling pretty down about it. I was reading my scriptures and I read 1 Nephi 3:7 "I will go and do the things that the Lord hath commanded for I know that the Lord giveth no commandment unto the children of men save he shall prepare a way...". As I read it I thought, I could replace "commandment" with "child" in that sentence - The Lord doesn't give any child to me that I can't handle. He loves me, and he loves these little people he's sending to me, and he will prepare a way for me as a parent.

I felt assured that while it's not always a walk in the park, it is a walk I don't have to take alone, and he is ready and willing to help me. And if I keep my trust in him and keep moving forward, he will prepare a way for me to make it, to keep going on. No matter how tired I feel, he is with me, willing to help me do the things I need to do to raise these little boys.

Other People's Words

Two things I've read recently that I've been thinking about - 

 

1. Someone had this quote on Facebook last week:

"Mile by mile, life's a trial.  Yard by yard, life is hard.  Inch by inch, life's a cinch"

For some reason the "Inch by inch, life's a cinch" got stuck in my head. Karl's been having some pretty rough nights recently, which has been leaving me feeling drained and discouraged often. So I've been trying to focus on the "inches" right in front of me, asking myself "What is the small thing I need to do right now?", and just not think about the rest. I think it's been helping me use my time better and not to get discouraged about all the things I'm not getting done right now.

2. Also from Facebook (I'm afraid I spend a lot of time perusing Facebook on my phone while nursing....), someone posted this article:

http://powerofmoms.com/2012/04/your-children-want-you/

I particularly liked the line "...at the end of the day, our children don’t want a discouraged, stressed-out mom who is wishing she were someone else."

I think it's so easy to see where I'm falling short as a mom/wife/person sometimes, but I liked the thought that instead of focusing on that and feeling discouraged about it, I need to remember that my kids love me for me, and not for what I get done.

So there you go, even Facebook can be good sometimes, ha ha.

Short, but not specifically sweet

Three things:

 1. The hardest part of being a parent for me is being happy and fun when I'm tired. I've been tired a lot recently so I'm working on this.

2. I ate way too much junk food last weekend, and I'm feeling it. I need to learn to say no to sugar sometimes...

 3. Karl is starting to smile and laugh quite often now and I LOVE it. So adorable.

Karl's Birth Story

I have to start of by saying this pregnancy had been so different from the start than my other 2. I had almost no morning sickness this pregnancy, to the point I really didn't think the pregnancy was viable. I had WAY more heartburn, and my ribs hurt even more then my other 2 pregnancies. I didn't have the constant BH contractions that I'd had with the other boys, and I felt like I gained weight and carried the weight I gained differently. In short, just a very different pregnancy. All of this probably should have prepared me for a very different labor/delivery as well...

Tuesday Jan 31 - Mom flew in! I was SO excited to have her here, and really hoping Karl would come soon so I could have as much time as possible with Mom AND Karl here at the same time. 

Wednesday Feb 1 - Had an appointment with the midwives, the midwife that day was Dustie, not my favorite one, she checked me and told me I was barely a 2, and baby was still at -2, so kind of high... She said she would try stripping my membranes to see if that would get anything started. We took Duncan to preschool and ran some errands, but I felt pretty discouraged that whole day, and went to bed early crying. 

Thursday Feb 2 - My due date. Jeff had been 10 days early, Duncan 5, so I'd never made it to my due date before. Grant's Aunt's birthday (his dad's only sister) is Feb 2, so Grant's dad was really hoping I'd have the baby Feb 2, so I woke up feeling a little sad because it didn't look like that was going to happen. For scripture reading that morning I picked up my Nov '11 Ensign and flipped through the talks just reading things I'd highlighted in the past. 

When I got to Elder Uchtdorf's talk "You Matter To Him" I read the story of when he was in army training in Texas feeling very alone and discouraged. Then he said "What mattered to Him was that I was doing the best I could, that my heart was inclined toward Him, and I was willing to help those around me. I knew if I did the best I could, all would be well. 

And all was well"

When I read that I felt peace that all was going to be well, and I just needed to do the best I could to stay positive. That day we ran more errands and did a few projects around the house, and early in the day I started to notice I was having pretty consistent contractions, more "real" feeling than my BH contractions had been before then. But they were staying pretty consistent around 5-10 min apart, and weren't increasing in intensity or closeness, so I did my best to ignore them. 

By late in the afternoon they were still the same, but because they hadn't changed or gone away I told Grant about them, and he was hopeful they would progress and we would be going to the hospital later that day/evening. But by bed time they were still exactly the same as they had been all day... So I went to bed hoping I could sleep through them. For the most part I was successful, I woke up to them a few times, but each time was able to go back to sleep pretty easily. 

Friday Feb 3

3:45 AM - I woke up to my water breaking, which was a shock, since my water had never really broken with Jefferson and Duncan until just before they were born. I woke up Grant kind of frantically, and we decided to head to the hospital so they could start the IV for the antibiotics since I was Group B strep positive this pregnancy. After we started driving there was some confusion as I'd forgotten to get the number I was supposed to call, but we finally got it all worked out and woke up the midwife on call and told her we were on our way to the hospital, and she said she'd meet us there but would get there after us. 

4:30 AM - We get to the hospital and fill out admission paperwork and wait in the waiting room. All this time I'm having contractions every 5 minutes that I can't talk through, but I'm still able to handle them pretty well. 

5:15 AM - They finally come and take us back to a room, where the midwife meets us. It was Tara who was on call, which I was happy about, I like her. They have me change into a hospital gown and hook up the contraction monitors, and then the midwife checks me - almost 4 cm, he's still high, at -2 station. 

I immediately feel very discouraged. Both my boys I was already 6-7 cm by the time I got to the hospital, and it was still hours before they were born. I'd been 4 cm and +2 with Duncan 24 hours before I even went into labor. So I'm feeling stupid for coming to the hospital so early, and waking the midwife up when I'll probably still be in labor for a day, but then the midwife says something doesn't feel right and she wants to do an ultrasound. 

They pull in the ultrasound machine, and it takes 10 min or so to turn on, and then she looks at the baby - he's breech. I couldn't believe it. They hadn't done any ultrasounds since my 20 week one, but the midwives had always thought he'd been head down feeling his position from the outside, and both Jefferson and Duncan had been head down from like 32 weeks on (I had later ultrasounds with both of them), and I'd just assumed this baby had been too. The midwife said the OB they work with was already at the hospital, he was with a patient that they were waiting for her to be ready to deliver, and she would go check with him, but at this point I was going to be having a c-section. 

I was... I don't know. Stunned? I guess I knew in the back of my head that things can always go wrong during labor, and a c-section was a possibility, but I never really thought I would actually have one. I started crying, mostly just trying to process it all I think. Tara was great, and sat with me, and talked me through how it would all go. She asked if I wanted to get an epidural then so I didn't have to deal with the contractions anymore, or if I felt I could wait and get a spinal at the surgery. They said a spinal is preferred, and I was handling the contractions pretty well, so I said I would wait. She said if they could get me in surgery by 6/6:15 they would do the c-section then, if not I'd have to wait until after shift change at 7:00, and it would be at like 7:30. I hoped and prayed that they would be able to get me in soon, because I wanted it to be over with and have my baby as soon as possible. 

But I should say at this point that even though I was kind of emotional and crying, when she told me that I was going to be having a c-section, once again the quote came to mind "And all was well", and I knew that a c-section was the right answer for us, and everything was going to be okay. 

6:15 AM - The OB's other patient was progressing slower than they originally thought, so the OB decided he could do my surgery before she was ready to deliver, so everything started to happen really quickly. The anesthesiologist came in and explained the spinal to me and had me sign the consent papers for that. Then they came and wheeled me into the OR, and I climbed up on the table and he put in the spinal. It wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be, I think I had prepared my mind for horrible pain, and it really wasn't awful. Then I laid down and they put up the drape and began prepping for the surgery. I was amazed at how quickly I felt numb it seemed almost immediate from when he put the spinal in. They brought Grant in, and within a couple minutes we heard a cry, and Karl was here! 

We didn't have our camera in the OR, so this fuzzy one from Grant's cell phone is the only picture we have

They took him over to the warming table, and Grant went over and watched them weigh him (8 pounds even, 21 inches long) and get him wrapped up in a blanket, then they brought him over to me. I don't think I cried when my other boys were born, but for some reason I started crying, and Tara helped me hold him and I just kissed his head and cried, I was so happy he was here and healthy. I started to feel sick from the stuff in my IV I guess, so Grant took him back until I was done with surgery.

7:00 AM - They wheeled us into recovery, and a lady came who helped me get Karl latched on and nursing, and he nursed for a good 20 minutes, then fell asleep, then the head nursery lady came in and did all the infant care stuff right there by my bed. Then they wheeled us up to our "mother and baby suite" where we stayed for the rest the time at the hospital. I couldn't believe it was over, and I already had a baby in my arms, it all felt like it went so quickly. The c-section wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be either. The "pressure and tugging" they told me I'd feel was very weird, but not horrible, and it was all over pretty quickly.

The first 2 days of recovery were not fun, I felt so... damaged? I just felt like I'd never be able to move without hurting again, I'm something of a drama queen sometimes, ha ha. But I started to feel better pretty quickly, they let me go home Sunday, and by Monday I was just taking regular ibuprofen and feeling pretty okay as long as I took it easy. 

 Meeting his brothers, this was probably the height of my misery, I was so itchy from the medicine in the spinal, so my face was all blotchy from scratching it, and I was so puffy and swollen from all the IV fluids, so ignore the sick looking lady in the background

Overall I feel really blessed in how everything turned out, and I can truly look back on the experience and say "And all was well". Even though I was very anxious about him coming so "late", with having a c-section I'm so glad he came after my mom was here, because I really needed the extra help. And even though a c-section wasn't what I was hoping or planning for, I feel like it was the right answer for getting Karl here safely, and it went very smoothly and I'm recovering really well. Alright, this has taken me forever to get written, so I'm just going to finish with this picture of the little man himself:

baby Karl, 3 days old

Christmas Video

Grant finished editing our 2011 Christmas video last night, and I think he did an amazing job, I keep watching it again and again, although I may be *slightly* biased. Here it is for your viewing pleasure:

Courage

I picked up our January Ensign the other day, and I was reading some of the articles, and I ended up writing so many quotes down in my notebook, it was so full of advice that felt so needed to me right now. I really liked the first presidency message by President Monson "The Abundant Life", and these 2 quotes on courage were my favorite.

"Whatever you decide to do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide on, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising to tempt you to believe your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to the end requires some of the same courage a soldier needs. Peace has it's victories, but it takes brave men and women to win them" - R. W. Emerson

" Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says "I'll try again tomorrow" "

Speaking of courage... Jefferson has been telling me recently that he gets teased at school for liking the color pink, and "baby" t.v. shows. I feel like he learns things so much better through stories, so I want to have stories to tell him about kids being teased and standing up for themselves and being kind in return. So if anyone knows of any such stories and would point me in their direction, or advice on dealing with teasing and little kids, it would be greatly appreciated.